TyreSafe launches Tyre Safety Month campaign with online briefing

Campaign themed on movie parodies from ‘Tyreflix Productions’ drawing attention to importance of tyre safety and easy ways to check their safety

Tyre Safety Month 2020: Judge Tread asks motorists to check their tyres every month (Photo: TyreSafe)

TyreSafe has launched its 2020 Tyre Safety Month campaign with its first online briefing. Following the success of its previous ‘Get Into The Groove’ campaign, TyreSafe has prepared a fresh batch of cultural parodies with which to publicise its ACT acronym – standing for Air pressure, Condition, Tread. A range of movie poster parodies, including ‘Judge Tread’, ‘The Good, The Bad, and The Under Inflated’, and ‘Done in 60 Seconds’, are available for garages, businesses and other organisations to encourage motorists to take better care of their tyres. The distribution of the materials will reflect the digitalisation trend of this year, driven by the necessity of adapting to Covid-19 Crisis conditions; a wide variety of banners formatted for each of the major social media networks will be available. The briefing featured a panel discussion with Stuart Lovatt, Highways England strategic road safety lead; Tony Crook, National Fire Chief Council lead officer road safety; Simon Turner, Driving for Better Business campaign manager; and James Luckhurst, Project EDWARD founder.

Stuart Jackson, TyreSafe chair, hosted the briefing, discussing road safety campaigning and the significance of tyre safety in reducing incidents and casualties. Opening with the ever-popular Worst of the Year rundown of the most appalling tyres spotted on vehicles over the past year, Jackson introduced the event with a wide range of statistics showing how important tyre safety is, headlined by the fact that around 170 people are killed or seriously injured every year due to defective tyres. While the safety of people is always the primary concern, another eye-catching statistic suggests that underinflated tyres could lead to fuel wastage of between £600 million and £1 billion.

Panel discusses importance of tyre safety message

TyreSafe’s digital Tyre Safety Briefing 2020, hosted by chair, Stuart Jackson

In a prerecorded video segment, TyreSafe discussed the importance of publicising and campaigning for increased awareness about tyre safety. This goes for end users of course, but also has an effect on the prominence of tyre safety messages within businesses and the emergency services. Luckhurst said he wants to encourage the partnership between police and communities to tackle the problem of people who don’t care enough about the safety of their vehicles and tyres. He added that motorists’ awareness of tyre safety in increasing road safety is “vital” in reaching “a minority” of people who continue to be ignorant of the vital role tyres play in their safety.

Praising the simplicity of TyreSafe’s ACT message, Lovatt said: “I still don’t think we’ve done enough to get the message out that we need to check our tyres as frequently as putting the bins out.” He explained that tyres have a central role in improving road safety, saying that for example without the necessary tread depth for the tyre to work properly, otherwise functional car components cannot be effective.

Conditions specific to 2020 and the Covid-19 Crisis were also acknowledged for their negative effect on tyre safety. While figures relating to the condition of tyres on vehicles that received a six-month MOT exemption are not available, TyreSafe predicted that this would have increased the number of unsafe tyres on the road this year. Previous Tyrepress articles on the subject come to a similar conclusion, with estimates putting tyre demand resulting directly from MOT test failures at nearly 2.5 million units annually (and the number could be even more).

Ultimately, Lovatt concluded in conversation with Jackson that tyre safety messaging is an effective means of mitigating the worst effects of road traffic accidents. Lovatt drew an analogy between the tyre safety messages and those related to Covid-19 safety measures popularly taken up this year. The way many have acted quickly to reduce risk of transmission suggests coming together to reduce risk in road safety could easily have an appreciable effect.